582 PROCEEDINGS OF SECTION F. 



Quae equidem bene scio esse uera ex eo quod, dum uiri cuiusdam,. 

 pene incisi, cadauer inseco atque aperio, intellexi illud urethrae fora- 

 men, inter initiandi ritus factum, ita posse augeri ut pueri cuiusuis 

 penis facillime posset inseri. 



The explanation of this custom is the difficulty experienced by the 

 younger members of some tribes in getting young women, who are 

 possessed by the old men. The mayor of Broome, Mr. Warden, who 

 has lived there for 17 years, informed me that great jealousy is shown 

 by the Wambas regarding their boys, and that more of the fights which 

 are very common amongst the black people of Broome have their 

 origins in the boys than in the women. 



I only intend to state the facts, which may be easily proved by 

 every other scientist visiting the country of Broome and Beagle Bay. 

 I suggest as possible that the primitive significance of the horrible 

 custom of subincision may be explained by conditions formerly exist- 

 ing in Avhich the difficulties regarding the possession of women by 

 the young men were extremely great. This condition being variable 

 and easily changed, I believe that in many tribes the subincision has 

 become a custom which is only performed because the ancestors did 

 the same, and without any practical importance. Therefore the con- 

 tradictions which I anticipate against the statements T have made 

 will be without any value. 



Dr. Roth at first, of course, was not inclined to accept my idea ; 

 but later, by a letter, he called my attention to his observation in the 

 Boulia district. (12) 



From Broome I made a trip to Java, where I contracted a serious 

 infection of malaria fever. 



During my visit to Java I had an opportunity of inspecting the 

 locahty where Dr. Dubois (1891-1893) discovered the remains of 

 Pithecanthropus. Digging at that place, on the border of the Benge- 

 wang River, I secured some fossil relics of elephas, rhinoceros, bos, and 

 cervus. The fragment of the skull of Pithecanthropus shows some 

 peculiar features by which it is near connected with the Australian type 

 of cranium. I am inclined to consider Pithecanthropus as a very 

 primitive form of real Tertiary man, connected in one direction with 

 the ancestor of the- Australian and Tasm.anian aboriginals, and in the 

 other direction with the fossil man of the European Stone Age (the 

 type of Neanderthal, Spy, and Krapina). 



(12) In connection with what you told me as to your new views about intro- 

 cision, please look at sec. 321, p. 180, of my ethnological studies. It is certainly 

 interesting that the Boulia name for a " whistler " is the vulva pyssessor. 



December 18th, 1906, R.M.S. Omrah. Dr. Roth. 



Mr. Herbert Basedow, in his " Anthropological Notes made on the South 

 Australian Government North- West Prospecting Expedition, 1903," made the 

 following interesting observation : In the Tomkinson Ranges members of the 

 Ullparidga tribe were observed to dance about a man who had killed a kangaroo, 

 and all the while to hold their subincised urethras to view, .... 

 and widening the slit to its utmost extent. Transactions of the Royal Society, 

 Adelaide, vol. xxvm., 1904, p. 3. 



